


i lost my fear of falling

by akamine_chan



Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: Alternate Universe - Multiple Timelines, Gen, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-27
Updated: 2015-11-27
Packaged: 2018-05-03 13:05:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,754
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5291957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akamine_chan/pseuds/akamine_chan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's like the brush of spider silk against his skin, something barely felt but impossible to ignore.  Gerard doesn't push, lets it percolate in his brain until it's ready.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i lost my fear of falling

**Author's Note:**

> From the bandom_meme prompt of: Multiverse AU, Gerard meets himself from a 'verse where Mikey killed himself at the Paramour.
> 
> Warning for suicide of alternate universe characters. Talk of depression and suicide.
> 
> Title from _It's Not A Fashion Statement, It's A Deathwish_ by My Chemical Romance.
> 
> Beta, as ever, by Ande. Encouragement by Jiksa.
> 
> Banner by winterlover - tell them how awesome their art is [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5420333).

It's like the brush of spider silk against his skin, something barely felt but impossible to ignore. Gerard doesn't push, lets it percolate in his brain until it's ready.

He hits the road, humming under his breath. It's overcast, rainy, and the sound of the tires on wet asphalt is almost hypnotic. He visits the comic store, spends some time at a coffee shop staring out the window at the busy L.A. street. 

The pull takes him down Santa Monica, onto Sunset, and then Glendale until it turns into the Two. He merges onto the Five, lets the afternoon traffic flow around him. He feels loose and disconnected as he circles back around, getting off on Hyperion. 

He passes streets and places that look familiar, from another lifetime. There are echoes rushing through his veins, and he tries to breathe through the suffocating feeling, ghosts clinging like cobwebs.

He finds himself on a wall-lined road, and parks next to a gate. His fingers flex and release on the steering wheel and he forces himself to pull out his phone, scroll through his contacts, make a call.

He waits, letting his mind empty out, settle into quietness.

The gate opens, and a young man approaches. Gerard rolls down the window, chats with him about inconsequentials, the weather and the latest celebrity shenanigans, trying to still the anxious thudding of his heart. 

He's handed a large set of keys and gets waved through the gate.

The house is empty and quiet. Gerard flips on lights as he moves from room to room, trying to drive away the darkness, but there's something shadowed that still lingers.

It's been almost ten years since they ran from this haunted place, cowed and terrified and broken. Most of the memories are hazy, but he can still taste the fear in the back of his throat.

Things have changed so much since then.

He wanders the grounds, following the dimly lit footpaths over the manicured lawn, through charming garden plots. The wind rustles through the treetops, and eddies around him, tousling his hair. The breeze brings with it the scent of damp earth, and it reminds Gerard fleetingly of freshly dug graves.

"You're a morbid fucker," he mutters to himself. His voice is jarring against the white noise inside his head.

The outdoor pool is lit up from within, phosphorescent blue-green lights along the bottom, It glows, eerie in the darkness, and Gerard can see his reflection in the still water. 

Except—

It's not _exactly_ him. He crouches, his eyes straining to resolve the differences, and his foot slips on the damp, pebbled lip of the pool and he falls—

—and he sits up with a gasp.

It's dark, but the small lamp next to him throws enough light for him to recognize where he is: his parents' basement in New Jersey. He's on the ratty couch, and when he realizes there's someone looming over him, he tries to scramble away.

"No, it's okay," a voice says, and Gerard freezes, because he knows that voice, even if he's more used to hearing it through his own head. 

"You're me." He's unexpectedly calm, confronting his dopplegänger.

"Yeah," his otherself agrees. "Well, sorta." The other Gerard stands up and yes, Gerard can see that they're not exactly the same.

This Gerard is skinny, painfully so. He's gaunt and sallow, and his hair is long, longer than Gerard ever managed to grow his. It's unkempt, and the whole basement stinks of unwashed body and sweat and booze. It's an old, familiar smell. 

He pushes his hair back out of his face and Gerard can't help the wounded little sound he makes at the mess of scars that cover this Gerard's forearm.

The other Gerard follows his gaze, and pushes down his long sleeves. He wraps his arms around his thin frame and kicks at Gerard's foot. He's a little unsteady on his feet, and it makes Gerard wonder how much he's had to drink. "So, what are you? Clone, time traveller, pod person, what?"

"Dunno." He doesn't feel like a clone, or a pod person. Maybe he's a time traveller, like the Doctor. "What year is it?"

"2015."

"Oh." It's ridiculous to feel disappointed, when he's sitting here talking to another version of himself. "For me, too."

The other Gerard picks up his pack of cigarettes and lights one, hands shaking and jerky, moving like spastic spiders. "So, what, then? What the fuck are you? Ghost of Christmas fucking Present here to show me how fucked up I am?"

Gerard flinches away from the venom in his own voice. "I don't—"

"Fuck that shit," the other Gerard snaps. He paws through the clutter on the desk, finds a vial of pills, shakes some out. He washes them down with a swig of vodka from an almost empty bottle. "Fuck off."

Gerard's at a loss. He doesn't know how to handle this otherself. In the past he'd snap right back, use words to cut where it'd hurt the most. But he's not that person anymore, hasn't been for years. "It can't be that bad," he says. "I know it might seem like—"

"Really?" the other Gerard interrupts. "Now that I've finally gotten the balls to do what I shoulda done years ago, you're gonna give me a stupid pep talk about how it gets better and I have so fucking much to live for?" His voice is biting. He stubs out his cigarette and immediately lights another, face turned away. "You're fucking kidding me."

With sudden clarity, Gerard _knows_. This isn't rock bottom, this is what happens when you break past that and _keep falling_. Down into a darkness where the light never, ever reaches. A place where the night is forever and it seems impossible to hang on for one more minute.

He reaches out, snags the sleeve of the other Gerard's sweatshirt, trying to keep him grounded. Gerard's been here, in this exact spot, knows how easy it is to just give it all up. Throw in the towel and call it a day. He remembers the temptation. "You can't. Think about Mom and Dad, and Mikey—"

The other Gerard laughs at that. The sound is sharp-edged, like glass. "Mikey's fucking gone, he's dead—"

The world wobbles while the edges of Gerard's vision fade to black. He can't breathe, there's a ringing in his ears, and he barely feels it when the other Gerard pushes on his shoulder, forcing his head down between his knees. His heart pounds in time to the shouting in his head, _Mi-key Mi-key Mi-key_.

He doesn't know how long he sits there, dazed and stunned, but when he can focus again, the other Gerard is watching him closely. "I don't understand. What— How—"

His otherself lights another cigarette, fumbling a little, and offers the pack to Gerard. His hands are shaking, but he manages to light one and take a deep drag.

"I take it your Mikey's still alive."

Gerard can only nod.

The other Gerard closes his eyes for a moment. "It was the fucking Paramour Mansion, we went there to record our next album—"

"Yes," Gerard whispers.

"—And that place was fucking haunted. We all went a little crazy while we were there—"

"I know," Gerard says. "I remember, I remember how bad it got, how we were all falling apart, but we left, all of us, together—"

"Not all of us."

"Mikey," Gerard mourns. It hurts, so fucking much, like what he imagines a gunshot wound would feel like, flesh ripped apart, bleeding out.

"It was my fault."

Gerard wraps his arms around himself and presses his face against his knees, wanting to deny it with every fiber of his being. But he can't, because everything that happened at the Paramour _was_ his fault.

He'd been so obsessed with that place, the ambiance of it, capturing the negative energy of that fucking house and channeling it into the record; he'd been blind to the fact that they'd been falling apart under the influence of the Paramour.

His Mikey had barely gotten out of there in time, sanity shredded almost beyond repair. _This_ Gerard's Mikey hadn't been so lucky. "I'm sorry. So fucking sorry."

"Me, too," the other Gerard slurs.

It's clear that whatever pills he's taken are starting to hit him hard. He sways on his feet. "We should call 911," Gerard says dully. "Get you to the hospital, get your stomach pumped—"

"No," the other Gerard says, and there's something final about the word. "Not this time."

Gerard gazes at him, at this alternate version of himself. Sees the guilt etched onto his face, and thinks about the potential and the possibilities lost to this Gerard.

It goes against the grain to let him go; Gerard is at a point in his life where he holds on tight to everyone with both hands. "Please—"

His otherself shakes his head, stumbles backwards a little and sits on the edge of the messy bed. "I'm so tired of hurting. I just want it to stop." He looks at Gerard, mouth trembling. "Will you stay? I don't want to be alone."

The words are like a kick to the gut, and Gerard struggles to catch his breath. He wants to scream, to fight, to drag his dopplegänger back into the world of the living, but deep inside his heart, he knows it's too late, this other Gerard is too far gone. "I'll stay." 

He curls up against the headboard of the bed, and settles the other Gerard close. He pulls out his phone and opens up the photo app, scrolling until he finds a picture of Mikey, from a couple of weeks ago. "Look."

The other Gerard touches Mikey's face with the tip of an unsteady finger. "He looks happy," he mumbles.

"He is," Gerard confirms. "He's been through some rough patches, but he's better, now."

"I'm glad." The words are soft and indistinct.

Gerard swallows hard and swipes to another picture of Mikey. "He's met this girl, and they're so happy together. She makes him light up from the inside."

"Good." His rise and fall of his chest is growing slower.

The other Gerard's eyes are closed, but he's smiling, a little. Gerard presses a kiss to the crown of his head, and tells his otherself about Lindsey and Bandit, and the happiness he's managed to call his own.

He talks until he's hoarse, and the only breathing he can hear is his own.

-fin-


End file.
